The Dog Crusoe and his Master | Page 4

on his heel, walked up to the
house, holding the pup tenderly in his arms.
Joe Blunt gazed after his friend with a grave, solemn expression of
countenance till he disappeared; then he looked at the ground and
shook his head.

Joe was one of the regular out-and-out backwoods hunters, both in
appearance and in fact--broad, tall, massive, lion-like,--gifted with the
hunting, stalking, running, and trail--following powers of the savage,
and with a superabundance of the shooting and fighting powers, the
daring and dash of the Anglo-Saxon. He was grave, too seldom smiled,
and rarely laughed. His expression almost at all times was a compound
of seriousness and good-humour. With the rifle he was a good, steady
shot; but by no means a "crack" one. His ball never failed to hit, but it
often failed to kill.
After meditating a few seconds, Joe Blunt again shook his head, and
muttered to himself; "The boy's bold enough, but he's too reckless for a
hunter. There was no need for that yell, now--none at all."
Having uttered this sagacious remark, he threw his rifle into the hollow
of his left arm, turned round, and strode off with a long, slow step
towards his own cottage.
Blunt was an American by birth, but of Irish extraction, and to an
attentive ear there was a faint echo of the brogue in his tone, which
seemed to have been handed down to him as a threadbare and almost
worn-out heirloom.
Poor Crusoe was singed almost naked. His wretched tail seemed little
better than a piece of wire filed off to a point, and he vented his misery
in piteous squeaks as the sympathetic Varley confided him tenderly to
the care of his mother. How Fan managed to cure him no one can tell,
but cure him she did, for, in the course of a few weeks, Crusoe was as
well, and sleek, and fat as ever.
CHAPTER TWO.
A SHOOTING MATCH AND ITS CONSEQUENCES--NEW
FRIENDS INTRODUCED TO THE READER--CRUSOE AND HIS
MOTHER CHANGE MASTERS.
Shortly after the incident narrated in the last chapter, the squatters of
the Mustang Valley lost their leader. Major Hope suddenly announced

his intention of quitting the settlement, and returning to the civilised
world. Private matters, he said, required his presence there--matters
which he did not choose to speak of but which would prevent his
returning again to reside among them. Go he must, and, being a man of
determination, go he did; but before going he distributed all his goods
and chattels among the settlers. He even gave away his rifle, and Fan,
and Crusoe. These last, however, he resolved should go together; and
as they were well worth having, he announced that he would give them
to the best shot in the valley. He stipulated that the winner should
escort him to the nearest settlement eastward, after which he might
return with the rifle on his shoulder.
Accordingly, a long level piece of ground on the river's bank, with a
perpendicular cliff at the end of it, was selected as the shooting ground,
and, on the appointed day, at the appointed hour, the competitors began
to assemble.
"Well, lad, first as usual," exclaimed Joe Blunt, as he reached the
ground and found Dick Varley there before him.
"I've bin here more than an hour lookin' for a new kind o' flower that
Jack Morgan told me he'd seen. And I've found it too. Look here; did
you ever see one like it before?"
Blunt leaned his rifle against a tree, and carefully examined the flower.
"Why, yes, I've seed a-many o' them up about the Rocky Mountains,
but never one here-away. It seems to have gone lost itself. The last I
seed, if I remimber rightly, wos near the head-waters o' the
Yellowstone River, it wos--jest where I shot a grizzly bar."
"Was that the bar that gave you the wipe on the cheek?" asked Varley,
forgetting the flower in his interest about the bear.
"It was. I put six balls in that bar's carcase, and stuck my knife into its
heart ten times afore it gave out; an' it nearly ripped the shirt off my
back afore I was done with it."

"I would give my rifle to get a chance at a grizzly!" exclaimed Varley,
with a sudden burst of enthusiasm.
"Whoever got it wouldn't have much to brag of," remarked a burly
young backwoodsman, as he joined them.
His remark was true, for poor Dick's weapon was but a sorry affair. It
missed fire, and it hung fire, and even when it did fire it remained a
matter of doubt in its owner's mind whether the slight deviations from
the direct line made by his bullets were the result of his or its bad
shooting.
Further comment upon it